


You Are Everything (And More)

by purplebookends



Category: Degrassi, Degrassi the Next Generation
Genre: F/F, au where dnc after episode 6 in season one never happened
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-24
Updated: 2016-05-29
Packaged: 2018-05-22 22:05:11
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,014
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6095456
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/purplebookends/pseuds/purplebookends
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It's always a good day when she is with Grace.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. I Don't Like Tuesdays But I Like You

It’s Tuesday.

Zoe normally hates Tuesdays.

But not today. Not when she’s with Grace. Never when she’s with Grace.

It’s Tuesday and Zoe is sitting in her bedroom, watching Grace caress the spines of her books with utmost care. She’s studying them and reading the titles, unknowingly mouthing the words as she reads them.

Zoe thinks it’s cute. Actually, she thinks it’s adorable.

Everything Grace does is, in Zoe’s eyes, some sort of a positive adjective.

She looks at Grace and she smiles. She looks at Grace and the butterflies in her stomach start dancing, like happy six year olds on warm summer nights. She looks at Grace and all she sees is love.

And then it hits her.

She loves this girl.

She loves this girl that’s caressing her book spines, treating them like fragile things – which of course, they are -. She loves this girl that wears black jeans and band tees. She loves this girl that always draws circles up and down Zoe’s back when they kiss. She loves this girl that’s standing in her bedroom, looking at her.

‘’You’re staring at me,’’ Grace says, ‘’what gives?’’

Grace comes over to her and sits down next to her on the bed. She grabs her hand and laces their fingers together.

Zoe smiles. She loves this too.

She looks up at her, careful not to miss every detail of her face as her eyes brushes over it. Brown eyes are staring back at her. Brown eyes filled with love and admiration for the other girl. Brown eyes filled with hour-long stories and sleepless nights.

Oh how Zoe loves listening to those stories.

Grace has stories – heaps of them.

Good ones too.

Zoe loves listening to them, but more so, she loves listening to her voice. She loves listening to her voice so much she often begs Grace to repeat the story about her first bike, the long version, just so that she can listen to her talk.

Zoe loves listening to Grace talk.

She has a way with words.

Zoe smiles again. _Grace and her words_.

‘’Nothing,’’ she tells her. But that’s a lie. It’s everything. With Grace, it’s everything.

It’s the way she tucks her hair behind her ear when it gets in the way, it’s the way she always bites her lip after Zoe kisses her; it’s the way she looks at Zoe like she’s the world.

To Zoe, Grace isn’t the world – she is much more than that. She is the whole galaxy – she is the whole existence. She is the sun, the moon and the stars. She is everything Zoe could ever wish for – and more.

Grace knows she’s lying.

She can see it in the smile on her face, the one she always tries to hide when they’re around others. Afraid that they’ll see, afraid that they’ll realize. But most of all, Grace thinks she’s afraid of what she’ll see, afraid of what she’ll realize.

But Grace doesn’t understand why.

She doesn’t understand why she would go out of her way to hide a smile so beautiful.

The first time Grace saw that smile, she was sure her heart would burst and her CF would be magically cured.

Zoe’s smile is magic.

 _Zoe_ is magic.

It took her a long time to realize that. She spent months trying to figure out what she felt for the girl – she spent even longer convincing herself that she was worthy of a love like this. A love so beautiful, so strong, so kind.

But when she did – oh when she did.

That was the first time Grace felt magic, when they shared their first, genuine kiss.

Grace remembers it clearly. It was a cold day in October; the leaves were falling from the trees and the dogs barking in the sun. They were walking down the sidewalk when the subject of the latest Stephanie Perkins novel came up, and Grace had to say something.

And then Zoe kissed her. And Grace kissed her back. And unlike the other kisses they had shared, the one they shared there, on the gloomy sidewalk, was real. It was genuine and it made Grace want to set fire to buildings and shoot up fireworks.

Grace loves that memory.

The memory of their first kiss as girlfriends is her favorite.

Zoe squeezes her hand. She can’t help but smile. When she’s around Grace, she can’t help but smile. It’s like a switch. When Grace isn’t around, Zoe’s smiles are small and heavy. But when Grace is, her smiles are big and effortless.

Grace looks down at their intertwined hands.

They fit so well together.

What a happy coincidence, Grace thinks, that they found each other’s hands to hold.

Zoe looks up at her again.

She’s smiling even bigger now.

Grace blushes.

‘’I love you,’’ Zoe tells her.

Grace has never understood the universe, or its ways, but in this moment, Grace is happy fate works the way it does.

‘’I love you too, dummy.’’

And Zoe smiles again. And Grace smiles. And then they’re kissing. And then the world is at peace, the birds are singing and the two girls are in love and it’s a good day.

It’s always a good day when she’s with Grace.


	2. I'm Not Going to Leave You Now, I Know It's Going to Get Better

Grace is upset.

Zoe can feel it.

It scares her a little; that she can feel it when Grace is upset, or happy – or feeling any emotion that overpowers the other feelings.

But it’s not just that Zoe feels it – she sees it too.

All day, Grace has been distant.

Grace isn’t the one for public display of affection – but she likes to hold Zoe’s hand in the hallway, which Zoe knows, because Grace always does it.

But she didn’t today. Today, she walked beside her to class, barely responding to Zoe’s chatter. This was Zoe’s first sign – because Grace loves responding to Zoe’s mindless chatter.

Her second sign was Tristan telling her that something seemed off about Grace.

_‘’You always think something seems off about Grace,’’ Zoe tells him._

_Tristan rolls his eyes at her, and whispers in a hushed tone. ‘’I’m serious. Your girlfriend seems bothered by something – and not the good kind of bothered.’’_

She wasn’t going to say anything. She shrugged it off and went on with her day.

But then Miles told her what Tristan had told her, and Lola – whom Zoe hadn’t spoken to since the Degrassi nudes scandal – chimed in her opinion, and Zoe couldn’t hold in her curiosity anymore.

It feels weird when she looks over at Grace, where she sits next to her, scribbling down something in her notebook. It feels as if she’s about to ask her a favor one usually would refuse to – like she’s about to ask her to reveal some big secret.

But she isn’t. And Zoe shouldn’t feel bad for asking. Because they are in a relationship, they are girlfriends and girlfriends talk about things. Even if _things_ are hard to talk about.

Grace feels Zoe’s gaze on her, and looks up slowly to meet her girlfriend’s enchanting brown eyes. Zoe excepts Grace to say something – to crack a smile and spit a snarky comment at her. But she doesn’t. She just sits there, and stares at her. This counts as Zoe’s fifth clue.

‘’Okay,’’ Zoe says, dropping her pen to the table and turning fully to face her girlfriend. ‘’What’s wrong with you?’’

Grace shifts in her seat, and looks down at her notes instead of meeting Zoe’s wondering eyes. Zoe sighs, grabs Grace’s chin with soft fingers and looks at her. ‘’Grace.’’

‘’It’s nothing.’’

Zoe raises an eyebrow at her. ‘’You’re lying.’’

‘’Yes,’’ Grace breathes, ‘’I am.’’

‘’Grace,’’ Zoe says softly, ‘’why are you lying to me? I’m your girlfriend, you can talk to me about anything – you know that.’’

Grace moves out of Zoe’s hold and glances to her left. Zoe doesn’t make a move to stop her; instead, she remains looking at her through confused eyes. She knows Grace; she knows that this is something she does when she can’t find her words.

‘’Grace,’’ Zoe pleads, ‘’talk to me.’’

Grace sighs, and all though not willingly – she turns around to face her girlfriend.

‘’It’s just-‘’ She stops. She doesn’t know how to word herself. Grace is good with words, she always has been. But now – with this, she isn’t able to form a sentence that makes sense.

She looks up at Zoe, and her warm, brown eyes.

Zoe doesn’t look impatient – for once, she just looks at her, waiting, expecting, needing.

It suddenly appears to Grace that she doesn’t know how to do this. She doesn’t know how to have this conversation.

‘’Yesterday.’’ Grace states.

_Good_ , she thinks, _you found a starting point._

She waits for Zoe’s impatient reply – waits for the annoyed ‘’yes?’’, but it doesn’t come. It takes a few seconds for Grace to realize that it isn’t coming. Because Zoe is waiting for her to talk about what’s bothering her. Because Zoe genuinely cares for her and wants to know. Because Zoe loves her.

_Because Zoe loves her._

Grace inhales. ‘’When we were at the library, Miles said something about your relationship – about his relationship with Maya, and all the nice things you did and all the exclusive dates you went on. And you had this look in your eyes, it looked almost like...longing. Like you missed it, like you wanted it back.’’

‘’Like I wanted to leave you to get back Miles and his money?’’ Zoe finishes off for her.

Grace remains silent while Zoe reaches for her hand.

‘’Grace, hey, look at me.’’

Grace does.

‘’I am in love with you. Foolishly completely in love with you. I don’t care about whatever expensive restaurant Miles took me to the summer we were together – mind you, it was barely a relationship – our movie dates are still my favorite. And you want to know why? Because it’s you. It’s your smile and it’s your eyes and it’s _you._ I love you. I have no doubts about that – if anything, it’s the only thing I’m sure of.’’

Grace blinks at her.

_Zoe loves her._

‘’I…I love you too.’’

And then Zoe smiles. And it’s one of those smiles that Grace is sure could cure cancer and save the earth from its environmental crisis – and it makes Grace’s insides go soft and her heart sing and she can’t help but smile in return.

‘’Are you sure? Are you happy?’’ Grace doesn’t know where it’s coming from, but she has to ask.

Zoe squeezes her hand. ‘’Grace, I don’t know what I did to give you the impression that I’m unhappy with what we have – because I’m not. I am more than happy with what we have. I don’t think I’ve ever been happier.’’

It’s true, too.

Just the other day, Zoe’s mother told her that she seemed relaxed, less stressed and generally…happier.

Grace knows it’s true too. Her mother has said the same thing – about her daughter and about Zoe.

Grace is happy.

Zoe is happy.

They are both happy.

Because Zoe Rivas loves Grace Cardinal, more than she herself can ever utter with words. And Grace Cardinal loves Zoe Rivas so much it sometimes hurts.

‘’I can’t really promise you much of anything,’’ Zoe says, ‘’but I can promise you that I won’t leave. I’m staying. Through the hospital visits and the sick days, through the fights and the bad times.’’

‘’Why?’’ Grace wonders, all though she knows the answer.

‘’Because I know things are going to get better. You don’t want to believe it, so – I have to believe it enough for the both of us.’’

Grace leans forward and kisses her. And when Grace kisses her, Zoe’s neck hairs rise and the butterflies run wild in her stomach and she feels _whole._ Complete – as if Grace’s lips on hers is the missing part of her that she’s always looking for.

‘’I hate you,’’ Grace tells her when they part. ‘’You’re always right.’’

Zoe laughs. _Oh, the Angels are singing._ ‘’I love you too, **dummy.** ’’

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this whole story is just fluff ok????????? feelings and fluff GREAT NO PLOT YES

**Author's Note:**

> honestly? this is just fluff and gracevas loving each other


End file.
